ANALOGUE has a seemingly straightforward objective. You start off as a deep space data miner, out on a mission to recover files from a ship that’s been floating undiscovered for several hundred years. In order to get your data and complete the job, however, you need to convince the ship’s AI to recover the files for you. Finding the hidden files and the story within them is rewarding in itself, but as you continue through the game, you naturally form a very real relationship with the personable AI. Game creator…

Fans of horror and gothic horror may have already heard of THE CHARNEL HOUSE TRILOGY. Set in a format typical of 90’s point-and-click adventures, it has a relaxed feel that encourages you to casually explore your surroundings, unravel the story and learn about the protagonist you play as. You start the game as Alex, a gothy 20-something girl living in New York who’s preparing to get out of the city for the weekend. Madeleine Roux (author of Asylum) makes her voice acting debut here, adding charmingly sarcastic witticisms as you click…

Movies based on video games are never “good”. Often they’ve been “godawful” (Super Mario Bros.), with a few falling into the so-bad-they’re-good category (DOA: Dead or Alive). The best they ever get is “okay” (Resident Evil), with the vast majority falling into the “bland” (Prince of Persia) or “gimmicky” (Final Fantasy) categories. So it may surprise you when I say that I really enjoyed Warcraft, While it certainly has no shortage of “bland” elements, and stumbles over a lot of chances it had to excel, I think it’s about as close as I’ve seen to a video game adaptation being “good” without actually earning that qualifier. It certainly has enough standout qualities for me to call it “above average”. As The Powerwaifu so aptly put it, “I wouldn’t kick it out of bed.”

The Mailbag is back. We’ll be appearing on Wednesdays moving forward. It messes up the alliteration of Monday Mailbag, but this will allow me to get my weekend reviews out earlier, and allow more time to write well thought out responses to all your pressing questions. Keep sending them, otherwise I’ll just have to do two Editorials a week instead. (BORING!)

Today’s mailbag delves into the gamification of the entertainment industry and ends with us counting the stars!

LISA: THE PAINFUL, an indie RPG, is loosely based on the novel Children of Men, so if you’re at all familiar with the book or the Clive Owen movie of the same name, you have a little taste of what you’re in for. It’s worth noting that Lisa has a predecessor, Lisa: The First, and a sequel, Lisa: The Joyful. I have not played The First, but didn’t find it at all necessary to enjoy The Painful. I got about 30% through The Joyful before calling it quits. It was a pale shadow in comparison to The Painful, which will be the subject of this review.